Ach eye the noo.

‘It’s shite being Scottish.’ Heard this before? Well you’ve obviously read Irvine Welsh’s Trainspotting – a brilliant novel focusing on a group of heroin addicts in Edinburgh during the late ‘80s. Up until now it was the only point of reference I had to Scotland, and a fairly bleak one at that.

It came as somewhat of a surprise then when I found myself on an overnight bus headed for Scotland’s capital with only a small backpack for a final three-day fling before heading home to Australia.

It’s a long 9-hour trip from London, but the fare is cheap and also saves on the cost of accommodation for a night. As is my luck, I had the misfortune to be seated next to an Indian man who thought it was absolutely necessary to talk on his mobile phone while the rest of the bus tried to sleep. He continued a conversation for the next hour or so and it took every ounce of strength not to stuff the ruddy Nokia into his mouth. Instead I put my headphones on my ears, covered my head in my jacket and prayed that his phone ran out of battery before my iPod did. Luckily for him, I managed to nod off to sleep and soon woke at 8am to find myself freezing cold in the middle of Edinburgh.

It really is a charming city, built on the site of an extinct volcano, it has a dark history of war, witch hunts and plenty of whisky. The old part of town has wide cobbled roads all leading off the ‘Royal Mile’ which runs directly through the city from Holyrood Palace all the way to the Edinburgh castle. Surrounding the city is a wall of green hills and rocky outcrops, it gave me a strange feeling of having stepped back in time to the 1800s.


Some interesting first impressions were the realisation that every second shop on the Royal Mile sells tartan something (whether authentic or otherwise), taxi cab drivers have sadistic desires to run people over and you can almost bet you’ll bump into a Buck’s/Hen’s party staggering down the street at 3 in the afternoon.

Luckily first impressions are occasionally wrong.

It was too early to check into our hostel so we thought we’d replenish our energy stores with a hearty Scottish breakfast. We found a small restaurant on the Royal Mile offering a big breakfast of eggs, bacon, sausage, toast, mushrooms and haggis for a mere 5 quid. It sounded promising. My travel companion at the time had never heard of Haggis, but I assured her she would enjoy it. The meal came and we devoured it quickly, although I managed to craftily conceal my portion of haggis under my napkin. Once plates were clean my friend turned to me and said ‘Haggis is just like meat pie! What’s it made of?’ I proceeded to inform her of what she had just consumed and needless to say she looked a little green for the rest of the day.

Full of food we decided to take a free walking tour of the city to get our bearings. Our tour guide led us past the usual tourist attractions: the Scotch Whisky Heritage Centre, Endinburgh Castle and a seemingly endless row of pubs. Images of the next three days started playing out in my head: dark corners, strong whisky, drunken lullabies.

That evening we decided to explore the city some more by taking part in a ghost tour. I was in the mood for getting the pants frightened off me. I’d already downed a couple of drams of Jameson and I was feeling nice and warm in an oversized coat. Our guide was a big giant of man with a grizzly beard (who else to take you on a ghost tour?) and I held hopes of this being a good night. Unfortunately the tour did not have the zing I was looking for. Maybe this is because my idea of a ghost tour involved of us being thrown into the moors ala ‘American Werewolf in Paris’ and having our scary guide tell us bone-chilling tales of murder and poltergeists whilst unknown creatures howled at us from across the marshes. However we did get to explore some graveyards by night albeit with traffic tooting in the background (way to spoil the mood, car.)


The following day we decided to hike up Arthur’s seat, which is situated in Hollyrood Park about 10 minutes walk from the centre of Edinburgh. It was a beautiful day and the walk was spectacular. We joined other tourists, locals and dogs as we made our way up the steep crags to the highest point in the area.



It took a little over an hour and a half but the view was worth the trek. The view is spectacular and you really get a good idea of the layout of central Edinburgh all the way down to the ports of Leith. The grey buildings are surprisingly far from being an eyesore and if anything I find it an endearing quality of the town.



For me Edinburgh was only a small sample of what Scotland has to offer. Unfortunately time restrictions meant that I was unable to explore further north to the Scottish Highlands. However I’ve had a taste (not Haggis) for Tartans and Whisky and shall one day return again. Ach Eye!

Art for Kodak's sake.

You know what really frustrates me? Tourists. Don't get me wrong, I know I'm here as a tourist, and I see my own fair share of the popular sights (I went to Notre Dame twice). What I don't understand is tourists and their obsession with cameras and taking photos of anything even remotely famous – as if by taking this photo they can go home and show everyone how well travelled they are.

Take yesterday for example. I'm in Paris at the moment, and thought I would wander down to the Musee d'Orsay for a few quiet hours of perusing the gallery's Impressionist works. I am yet to see a Van Gough in the flesh, and this was the perfect place to spend a casual Saturday afternoon.

There was no queue to get into the d'Orsay and even as I moved around the gallery I noticed a distinct lack of large crowds. Where was everybody? As I moved upstairs it suddenly dawned on me that some of the 5th floor rooms were dedicated entirely to Van Gogh pieces.

Sure enough as I reached the top floor I heard the distinctive murmur of a room full of people.

Now I know Van Gogh had an excellent eye for colour and technique, but there were rooms full of Renoir's, Monet's and Manet's in other parts of the building, why was everyone so obsessed with this one? What made matters worse was I couldn't stand for two seconds admiring the skilfully applied brushstrokes before two or three Leica/Nikon/Canon lenses were shoved over my shoulder and started snapping away. I was appalled as I watched these people move around to almost every painting taking photos; of the canvas, themselves with the canvas and even their significant other with the canvas. Some even posed like models beside the painting. It’s like they didn’t even care about what they were standing next to. It’s a quick snap and then move on to the next one. Do they even know what they are photographing?

As I scanned the room I realised that other people were doing the same thing with small point-and-shoots and even video cameras.

I was so frustrated that I left the room in haste. As I walked downstairs I thought to myself; shouldn’t art be enjoyed because an individual finds it beautiful or evocative? Have we become so blinded that we only want to see an artwork because it appears on coffee mugs, t-shirts, mouse pads and tea towels? And to make matters worse, it seems that a mental picture is just not enough anymore.

I still vividly remember seeing my first Basquiat. I was in Barcelona and it moved me in a way no other painting has managed to achieve yet. I had to sit down in front of it and admire it for a while. It was by no means his best work, but I could not comprehend that he had stood in the same position I was now, Charlie Parker blaring in the background while he contemplated what to do next. That’s what I call an art experience. I will admit I took a photo of it, but it was the only one from the whole exhibition!

So to be perfectly honest I’m not totally against people taking Kodak moments of some art works, nor I am I going to tell someone to stop. They are free to do whatever they want, just so long as they spend time admiring it first, taking in the finer details and only saving their cameras for the ones they really take real pleasure in. I fear very soon that art may become so transparent that the magic will be forgotten, and people will take these pieces of work at their face value, rather than being awed by its deeper meaning. It would be an absolute travesty.

Terry's World.

It’s just after 9pm on a chilly Thursday evening and I find myself sitting at a square table in a small Bavarian bar down a back street in the heart of Berlin. I feel slightly out of place, due to the unnerving gaze of some of the locals. To the left of me sits Ziggy, a non-English speaking German who enjoys double denim and a cigarette poised constantly in his right hand. To my right is a man who I know slightly more about. His name is Terry Brewer. He dislikes bad grammar and frowns upon people with green hair and rings in their noses. He has taught me more about Germany in two days than any history teacher could achieve in two years.


As we sit chatting over a plate of German sausage and pickles with a side of beer Terry tells me that the last 20 years of his life have all but rolled into one. ‘Where has the time gone?’ he says.

Terry is an interesting character to say the least. He is nearly 74, served in the British Naval Intelligence and has been taking people on his famous Brewer tours of Berlin for over two decades. This means that not only did he see the fall of the Berlin wall, but he’s also seen the gradual rebuilding of neglected infrastructure that has begun to take place over the last 15 odd years. How many tour guides can proudly offer that kind of insight? Probably none, and yet Terry is as humble as anything.

‘It’s weird.’ He says. Barely 3 years ago this was empty land – just piles of rubble or crumbling buildings’ he motions at a large block of offices and housing estates. I struggle to comprehend what this place must have looked like until Terry shows me some photos of the vacant blocks at an information point nearby.



As we walk further around he city it suddenly dawns on me what the people of Berlin have done to this city. They have given new life to an area devastated by war and civil unrest; the Berlin Wall is now an art space, derelict buildings have become studios or live music venues and properties once destroyed by bomb raids are being restored to their original condition. Admittedly this does mean that the whole of Berlin oozes a cold, industrial façade – but this is part of its history. Look beyond these walls though and you find a very complex metropolis. What surprises me the most are the great expanse of glorious parks and gardens. They form islands of green amongst a sea of grey.




In fact it’s incredibly hard to imagine that just over 20 years ago this city was so divided. It seems so peaceful now. Germans mix with Jews (even in Jewish schools), and members of allied countries are living and working here on their own free will. Remnants of past years are all but left to the pages of history and the glass cases of museums. It’s not that Germans are trying to forget the past, they are just moving on. For nearly a century now there has been no palpable way of life. Now they have a chance to show some pride in their country and their once war-torn capital.


I must admit, the locals still aren’t overly friendly, but I think this is a result of being more reserved rather than being a display of arrogance. One thing is clear - they’re certainly not French. As a slight consolation, when you do find a chance to talk with one of them you realise that most of the time their English is impeccable. The only German I know is ‘danke,’ ‘nein!’ and a collection of derogatory swear words. I could still have fluid conversations with all the locals, just so long as I slowed my abnormally fast-paced Australian accent to a coherent and understandable speed.

A waitress comes to remove our plates. Terry says something to her in German and she lets out a laugh. ‘I told her the service was lousy’ he chuckles as she walks away. I shake my head and smile. He is a constant source of amusement.

Terry really is an excellent guide, and I recommend anyone coming to Berlin to partake in one of his many daily tours. He is a wealth of knowledge and explains everything in such detail and with such an enthusiastic demeanour that you can’t help but become fascinated by what he is saying. Occasionally he will repeat himself, but this only adds to the learning process. I am soon infatuated with Berlin and its complicated history. I yearn to know more.

‘I know an awful lot about a lot of things, but I don’t pretend to know everything about everything,’ is Terry’s famous mantra. He repeats it constantly and he means it. He does know an extraordinary amount about Berlin, and the rest of the world for that matter. Just be intelligent and don’t ask an ignorant question is my suggestion. You’ll be praised as a result.

I take two tours with Terry in the seven days I am here. The second one is the most fulfilling. Our contingent consists of a Jewish-American boy that seemed two loaves short of a basket, Terry and myself. We’re being led on ‘The Third Reich’ tour which takes us through understanding the most evil of Hitler’s plans to praising the resilience of the people who opposed him. Terry seems intent on giving the Jewish-American and myself a hard time. We are constantly tested on our general knowledge. He means no harm though. These tours are a great form of entertainment and at the same time a great way to learn Berlin's history.


This expedition is meant to last 4 hours and instead lasts 8. The man can certainly talk. As is customary at the end of the day, Terry invites me to join him for a beer at his favourite bar that he fittingly likes to call ‘his bar.’ I graciously accept. This is where we sit right now.

An evening with Terry could easily turn into a free history lesson. But I soon find out this is no time to talk about Berlin. This is Terry’s down time. We watch non-specific European soccer and I listen to him talk fluent German to his many friends that either regularly frequent the bar or work there. He is well know and well liked. He can communicate in 10 languages. He is a legend in this city and it is an honour to know him really.

After a little while I turn around and find Terry fast asleep in his chair, a half empty glass of beer slowly bubbling away in front of him. I smile. He has had a long day and a longer week. I pay the bill and make a stealthy exit making sure not to wake him.


Please, if you ever find yourself in Berlin, make sure you find Terry. I assure you it will not be a disappointing encounter.

Fearn.

The fix.

You know what most places in Europe have that Melbourne doesn't? Terrible coffee. Like what I did there? Seriously, it's a disgrace. Maybe I was drinking my cup of Joe at all the wrong places or maybe the baristas' were having a bad day, but I just couldn't for the life of me find a decent daily grind.

Now I'm no coffee connoisseur, but I believe I have the capacity to tell a good cuppa from the next. I tried cappuccino, caffe latte and even espresso in over five countries, but all were horrible - even bordering on undrinkable. I thought the Europeans were renowned for their coffee making abilities! I was wrong. I even tried Starbucks...on both sides of the street.

Actually I stand corrected. Today I found my first decent coffee. I was in Berlin, waiting for the Ramones museum to open. I found a homely little cafe called 'Weinerei.' It was a last ditch effort and I put all my chips on the table and bought a double espresso. It was delicious. Perfect temperature with the slightest hint of caramel and chocolate.

This doesn't mean my argument is flawed however. One good espresso over an eleven week period of drinking coffee does not equate to good odds.

Maybe it's because I'm a snob then. A snob that knows nearly nothing about coffee, just one that has been spoilt by Melbourne's selection of marvelous morning mud.

Alliteration aside I make a valid point. Last year Starbucks announced it would be immediately closing 61 of its stores across Australia. It is an extraordinary number, considering it reduced the overall number of stores to just 23. I even did the research on which stores are still open. Queensland has 8, New South Wales 10 and Victoria a mere 5. This leads me to the conclusion that either Brisbane and Melbourne have great coffee or that people from Sydney have no taste. Either way there was something greater than a 'troubled economy' driving the Green Giant away from Melbourne. I know what it was. Do you?

I even found an anonymous quote that stated 'In America you can buy bucket-sized cups of coffee in any flavour you like other than coffee-flavour.' Hilarious. Case closed.

I'm sorry, I had to get that off my chest. It's me bothering me for weeks.

To end this brief rant I just want to say one thing: Melbourne, as far as I'm concerned, makes the best coffee in the world. Cherish it. Think about it next time you travel abroad. You will long for it dearly.

I will happily talk to anyone who feels they can prove me wrong. I think I have a certain friend in New York who may like to discuss this topic further...

Until next time, espresso yourself.

Fearn.

The streets of Lisbon.

Barca.

Whoa. Has it really been this long since I posted my last entry? Time sure flies when you are traveling. I have so much to tell now. Where should I start? Does anyone even bother reading this anymore? If you do, settle yourself down as this could take a while.

I think I’ll begin where I left off. Barcelona – a city that somehow managed to captivate me into a nine-day-stay and no end of stories to tell.

We traveled a long 10 hours to ‘Barca’ from Nice by bus. I love coming to a new city in a new country. It’s like you’re starting completely from scratch. Almost always I know nothing about the city I’m entering and it’s this naiveness that excites me the most. Learning a new language, sampling new foods and anticipating the pleasure of immersing myself in a new culture. Naturally I couldn’t wait.

We were staying in a nice hostel, near the top of the infamous ‘La Ramblas’ street known for its pick pockets, prostitutes and performers (sounds like Athens all over again!) Around the corner was a Gaudi designed house and a bit further up the road was his masterpiece La Sagrada Familia. This was sounding good already.


Barcelona is one of those cities that reminded me of home. It is stylish, young and bursting with culture. Every corner you turn you find small bars and cafés or people selling artisan goods or food in small stalls. The streets are clean, and the people are friendly.


I even adopted my first soccer team. FC Barcelona were playing an exhibition match at the famous Camp Nou during our week here. Somehow we became so immersed in the excitement for this game that we promptly bought tickets, a brand new ‘away’ jersey and a soccer ball. Go Barca.


I spent the next few days in the El Raval and university districts, which bordered two fantastic galleries. One gallery, the CCCB, was showing two uniquely different exhibitions. One was titled ‘ The Jazz Century’ and explored the rise of Jazz from the beginning of last century until now, using a chronological combination of vinyls, posters and art works including my very first Basquiat.






The other exhibition was particularly intriguing as it took a look at ‘Gangs of the 80s’ focusing exclusively on Spanish juvenile delinquency cinema which peaked between 1978 and 1985. The exhibition was a great insight into how Spain as a country has developed over the years, specifically through its youth.


They had even set up one room like an old arcade parlour.


Funnily enough, it seems that most of Barcelona is of a youthful age. I rarely ever saw anyone older than fifty. This is obviously a reflection of the vibrancy of this city – it has so much energy, it’s no wonder I enjoyed my time here so much.


I especially loved the food. There was one night in particular where I was absolutely ravenous. I went out in search of food to satisfy my hunger. I knew there had to be something, wait, anything. I was looking for the kind of restaurant that you find three corner-turns down a back street, the one you spend 25 minutes searching for and are more than always rewarded for your efforts. It was 10.17pm (a normal time for eating in Spain) and I was ravenous. I came so close to abandoning the search when out of nowhere appeared three large red neon letters – W-O-W-! they spelt. It had to be good.


It was a dark street and there were lanterns on the tables. They didn’t speak much English. They mistook my order of a vegetarian burger for a beef one. Yet the beef burger was superb, the beer was delicious and the atmosphere was perfect. I certainly wasn’t complaining.


Barcelona is definitely a city I will return to. It was so welcoming and friendly and so hard to leave. I take with me a new sports team and a plethora of new ideas and influences. I love this place.

It's like a boot kicking a ball.

Yep, it's official. I'm moving to Italy; where fresh food, a sophisticated style and a laid back approach to life is the norm. There are beautiful landscapes, magnificent coastlines and quaint villages. The population are attractive, refined and their cars are the same. Can you offer me a reason not to live here? Best answer receives a Margherita flavoured Gelato.

Our Italian adventure started with an all-nighter in Paris in order to avoid paying for an extra nights accommodation and to catch an early morning flight to Venice. Needless to say alcohol was involved and when we arrived at Marco Polo airport we were so wrecked we couldn't even make it through customs. Sleep was inevitable and the floor looked surprisingly comfortable.

We woke sometime around lunchtime to the clunking of yet another luggage carousel as it carried a load of tightly glad-wrapped suitcases in front of a hoard of camera-toting tourists. We pulled ourselves up, rubbing sleep from our eyes and stumbled out of the terminal to catch a train into town.

Venice is a bizarre and amazing city and consists of 118 islands formed by 177 canals. Nearly 400 bridges connect these islands and the result in a maze of small lanes and cobbled streets which make it nearly impossible to navigate anywhere. A distinct lack of street signs means map reading skills become obsolete and most of the buildings are so similar that nothing can be used as a point of reference anyway.

Despite an obvious lack of direction however we actually thoroughly enjoyed delving into the narrow streets to explore the small boutiques and cafes the Venetians had to offer. The city’s motto should be ‘Get lost, you’ll love it.’

Wanting to see the city from a different angle we decided to hire a gondola. It is an extremely expensive venture and after some crafty haggling we finally found a Gondolier who was willing to bargain the price down to somewhere around the cost of buying a small car. You’re only in Venice once though right?


After the gondola ride we found a small pizza restaurant by one of the canals and enjoyed a vino or two while we waited for the evening to set in. We were saving on another night’s accommodation by catching an overnight train to Rome that turned out to be a big mistake. The compartment was perfect for cooking a pizza and the train made more noise than a dump truck driving through a quarry. Definitely not ideal conditions for sleeping, How many sleepless nights is that now? I’ve lost count.


Rome was fantastic. It was significantly cleaner and less polluted than Athens and it seemed the Italians had a much better way of displaying their ancient ruins – mainly by not covering it all in scaffolding. We only had a day or two here so a quick whirlwind tour of the Vatican, the Colosseum, Trajan’s Column, Trevi Fountain and the Spanish steps had us sorted. We may have fit a pub-crawl in their somewhere as well. When in Rome.


From Rome we were headed down to Sorrento for a three-day tour that included Pompeii, Capri and the Amalfi coast. It was here that my infatuation for this country came into fruition.

Pompeii was the first stop before we got to Sorrento, and, for me in particular it was an extremely surreal experience. It might sound a little weird but the better half of my schooling years were spent trying to decipher the complexities of the Latin language. For a restless schoolboy, Latin is very low down the scale of exciting school activities. Luckily for us however, the textbooks we used for the subject contained lots of colourful pictures of Pompeii to distract us from the excentric ramblings of manic Latin teachers (none who shall be named here). Speaking of rambling, the point I am trying to make is that all the images in the books were now seen through the lens of my own camera. I was standing in the famous petrified city that Caecilius once strolled through on his way to the market. Fantastic.



I suppose a more suitable phrase would be ‘parturient montes, nascetur ridiculus mus,’ which translates literally as ‘mountains will be in labour, and a ridiculous mouse will be born.’ Well, in this case the people who built Pompeii were the hard working labourers and the eruption of Mount Vesuvius (the ridiculous mouse) meant they had nothing to show for it. Plausible justification?

This was the case of course until the ingenious Italian archaeologist Giuseppe Fiorelli discovered that he could inject plaster into the cavities left by the victim’s bodies in the hardened lava. The result is truly remarkable and means the people of Pompeii have something to show for their toils.


From Pompeii we went further south to Sorrento, which was my first real taste of Italy-by-the-sea. We used this town as our base and spent a day on the island of Capri followed by a day driving along the Amalfi coast. The shopping was great here and the food and wine was even more palatable. We stopped at three towns; Positano, Amalfi and Ravello and only photos can describe such scenery.



Florence was our next stop and we soon discovered it was a deceptively small city, but one full of charm and stunning Renaissance architecture. At its heart is the Gothic Duomo and this was easily the most magnificent cathedral we had seen on our whole trip. Unfortunately the queues for ‘Mike’s Dave’ were huge and we were unable to manage waiting in the stifling summer heat for a chance to see him. No love lost though as we’ve managed to see enough prominent art in the last six weeks to last me a lifetime. Well almost.



Our last stop in Italy was the Cinque Terre and it was by far the most beautiful. There are five towns stretched over 12km of sheer cliff faces that fall right into a bright blue Mediterranean sea. Each town is a cluster of pastel coloured buildings, all huddled together around small inlets that allow for fishing boats and leisurely swimming. There is a walking trail that connects the five villages and it varies in difficulty from an easy stroll to a rough and physically challenging hike. Why did we try and run it?


The most charming aspect of these towns is they don’t really offer any sort of hotel or hostel to stay in. Instead there are several agencies set up which find you accommodation in people’s houses, spare rooms or on their couches. It is an interesting concept and meant you could be crammed into an apartment with eight other people. No harm in a bit of sharing though. On the topic of sharing we did order a pizza in the town of Riomaggiore that was advertised as being fit for six people. We probably could have eaten two of them.



In all Italy really had a defining effect on me, and it probably shows heavily through my eating habits and change in clothing – Linen shirts anyone? I would love to have spent a bit more time here but the travel train must continue. Maybe one day I can call a little corner of Italy my home.

Nice is next followed by Spain.

Farewell Bel Paese.